Maybe Clevo, since they are more of an OEM producer for other brands meaning they don't control all the eyes on the hardware all the way to the sale point, i.e. to sneak things in.

At this I can't think of anyone I'd trust less. People have their complaints about every manufacture, but as far as I know, none of them have a track record as bad and as consistent as levono. Personally, I'm looking at system76 and Framework for my next laptop.

Who do you have to trust the least? The other two choices are Chromebooks and Macbooks, or some homegrown Linux solution. Of those, only Chromebooks are locked down to the point that you can't do anything with it unless you intentionally unlock it. Which means it's safe for some kinds of things but not others, depending on your threat model.